From ts at meme.com.au Fri Dec 5 23:21:13 2008
From: ts at meme.com.au (Tony Smith)
Date: Sat, 6 Dec 2008 18:21:13 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] December Meeting?
Message-ID: <9E6547B7-B27D-4E6F-8AB2-8A2C3B5F729B@meme.com.au>
I haven't seen or heard mention of whether we are planning to meet in
December, which would presumably mean this coming Wednesday.
If we are and it is at a venue suitable for presentations, I'd be
happy to address one important bit I left understated in my OSDC
lightning talk and say a little or a lot about the Perl scripting
environment inside the just released cross-platform Golly 2.0 cellular
automata environment: http://golly.sf.net/
Tony Smith
Complex Systems Analyst
Meme Media
Melbourne, Australia
http://www.meme.com.au/
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From melbourne-pm at popcorn.cx Sun Dec 7 04:34:45 2008
From: melbourne-pm at popcorn.cx (Stephen Edmonds)
Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 23:34:45 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] December Meeting?
In-Reply-To: <9E6547B7-B27D-4E6F-8AB2-8A2C3B5F729B@meme.com.au>
References: <9E6547B7-B27D-4E6F-8AB2-8A2C3B5F729B@meme.com.au>
Message-ID: <493BC2E5.4000008@popcorn.cx>
From what I remember, the talk at the last meeting was that if we were
to have a December meeting, it would probably be another social one at a
pub.
One option for that is to join up with the next Sub Standards meeting
which is also on the 10th. But the venue for that is still TBB.
http://pubstandards.org/asia_pacific/australia/melbourne
Stephen
Tony Smith wrote:
> I haven't seen or heard mention of whether we are planning to meet in
> December, which would presumably mean this coming Wednesday.
>
> If we are and it is at a venue suitable for presentations, I'd be happy
> to address one important bit I left understated in my OSDC lightning
> talk and say a little or a lot about the Perl scripting environment
> inside the just released cross-platform Golly 2.0 cellular automata
> environment: http://golly.sf.net/
>
>
>
>
> Tony Smith
>
> Complex Systems Analyst
>
> Meme Media
>
> Melbourne, Australia
>
> http://www.meme.com.au/
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> Melbourne-pm mailing list
> Melbourne-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/melbourne-pm
--
_ _ _
Stephen Edmonds _/ \_ / \_/ \
Melbourne, Australia / \
/ O \ / " \
stephen at popcorn.cx / ___ \ | O |
http://popcorn.cx/ \_____/ \___/
From ben at benbalbo.com Sun Dec 7 16:15:58 2008
From: ben at benbalbo.com (Ben Balbo)
Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 11:15:58 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] December Meeting?
In-Reply-To: <493BC2E5.4000008@popcorn.cx>
References: <9E6547B7-B27D-4E6F-8AB2-8A2C3B5F729B@meme.com.au>
<493BC2E5.4000008@popcorn.cx>
Message-ID: <493C673E.5000408@benbalbo.com>
> One option for that is to join up with the next Sub Standards meeting
> which is also on the 10th. But the venue for that is still TBB.
I was going to suggest that. If anyone has any recommendations for
location, please feel free to let me know directly, or join the Pub
Standards Melbourne mailing list[1] and join the banter.
Note the rules of Sub Standards dictate we can never go back to the same
pub twice, so if it's listed under *Been* on this page:
> http://pubstandards.org/asia_pacific/australia/melbourne
then it's no longer an option ;-)
Cheers!
BB
[1] Email melbourne-join at pubstandards.org or visit
https://secure.benshosting.com/mailman/listinfo/pubstandardsmelbourne
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From ben at benbalbo.com Mon Dec 8 15:46:26 2008
From: ben at benbalbo.com (Ben Balbo)
Date: Tue, 09 Dec 2008 10:46:26 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] December Meeting?
In-Reply-To: <493C673E.5000408@benbalbo.com>
References: <9E6547B7-B27D-4E6F-8AB2-8A2C3B5F729B@meme.com.au> <493BC2E5.4000008@popcorn.cx>
<493C673E.5000408@benbalbo.com>
Message-ID: <493DB1D2.2000201@benbalbo.com>
>> One option for that is to join up with the next Sub Standards meeting
>> which is also on the 10th. But the venue for that is still TBB.
A venue has been decided, should you wish to join us.
We'll be meeting at the Niagara Hotel, 383 Lonsdale Street at around
6.30 or 7pm.
I won't send any more emails to the MPM list regarding this meetup (it's
not exactly on topic), but if you're the type that would like to join
some geeks for random banter over beer on a monthly basis don't forget
to join the mailing list (melbourne-join at pubstandards.org)!
Cheers!
BB
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From alec.clews at gmail.com Wed Dec 10 12:35:26 2008
From: alec.clews at gmail.com (Alec Clews)
Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 07:35:26 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] Free pdf of Higher-Order Perl
Message-ID: <1228941326.7996.2.camel@k10>
For those who don't read /., you can get a free PDF copy of Higher-Order
Perl from http://hop.perl.plover.com/book/
--
Alec Clews
Personal Melbourne, Australia
Jabber: alecclews at jabber.org.au PGPKey ID: 0x9BBBFC7C
blog:http://alecthegeek.wordpress.com/
From adam.clarke at strategicdata.com.au Wed Dec 17 02:39:26 2008
From: adam.clarke at strategicdata.com.au (Adam Clarke)
Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2008 21:39:26 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] [OT] Does she run Perl 6?
Message-ID:
Damian Conway on the Radio
http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2008/s2448216.htm
From andrew.stuart at flatraterecruitment.com.au Sun Dec 21 17:07:58 2008
From: andrew.stuart at flatraterecruitment.com.au (Andrew Stuart)
Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2008 12:07:58 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] Melbourne job: Perl developer - junior to mid-level
In-Reply-To: <738B9191-5301-4DE9-A240-08C44454F792@flatraterecruitment.com.au>
References: <738B9191-5301-4DE9-A240-08C44454F792@flatraterecruitment.com.au>
Message-ID:
Home ADSL 2+ included (if available in your area).
This South Melbourne based company is highly successful and continuing
to grow. We're looking for a passionate Perl developer to join the team.
The company runs a global network of Linux servers handling RFC822
message processing.
We're looking for a passionate and talented Perl programmer to join us
- this is a great environment to work in with a hardworking and also
fun atmosphere.
Your choice of development environment - we'll provide you with a
computer to work with operating systems made by Steve, Bill or Linus -
it's up to you.
The key requirement is experience and an interest in Perl
programming. We are happy to consider people with junior to mid-
level experience.
Skills Required
** OO coding skills
** Enjoys Perl coding
** Passionate about development
** SQL coding skills
** You'll be taught everything else you need to know
We're looking for someone who:
** Is passionate about coding
** Gets along well with others in a team
** Is not dogmatic and does not get upset when technical decisions
don't go their way
** Flexible and adaptable ? willing to do what needs to be done
You'll need to be friendly and a nice person to have around.
Apply now!
To apply, send your resume to info at flatraterecruitment.com.au
Enquiries to (03) 9696 1616
www.flatraterecruitment.com.au
From tjc at wintrmute.net Sun Dec 21 23:18:00 2008
From: tjc at wintrmute.net (Toby Wintermute)
Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2008 18:18:00 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] DateTime::TimeZone breaking under PAR?
Message-ID:
Hmm,
I encountered an odd problem with DateTime::TimeZone today.
When using it via a PAR archive, it refused to determine the local timezone.
(This was on a Debian Etch fresh install, albeit with upgraded PAR
libraries, since the normal Etch ones are quite broken, and then
confirmed on an Ubuntu Hardy setup as well.)
The test script that fails:
----------------timetest.pl------------
#!/usr/bin/perl
use strict;
use warnings;
use DateTime;
use DateTime::TimeZone;
my $tz = DateTime::TimeZone->new( name => 'local' );
print "Success!\n";
----------------------------
Create the PAR with:
pp -o datetime.par -M DateTime::Locale::en timetest.pl
(That's on Etch.. If I'm on Hardy I need an extra: -M
DateTime::TimeZone::Local::Unix )
Then execute it:
parl datetime.par timetest.pl
I get "Cannot determine local time zone", rather than "Success!", on
both Etch and Hardy.
DateTime versions:
Etch - 0.35
Hardy - 0.42 and then 0.4501
DateTime::TimeZone versions:
Etch - 0.42
Hardy - 0.7701 and then 0.8301
Any thoughts if I'm Doing It Wrong, before I submit to RT?
Cheers,
Toby
From daniel at rimspace.net Mon Dec 22 00:36:28 2008
From: daniel at rimspace.net (Daniel Pittman)
Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2008 19:36:28 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] DateTime::TimeZone breaking under PAR?
In-Reply-To: (Toby
Wintermute's message of "Mon, 22 Dec 2008 18:18:00 +1100")
References:
Message-ID: <87d4fkk3n7.fsf@rimspace.net>
"Toby Wintermute" writes:
> I encountered an odd problem with DateTime::TimeZone today.
>
> When using it via a PAR archive, it refused to determine the local timezone.
> (This was on a Debian Etch fresh install, albeit with upgraded PAR
> libraries, since the normal Etch ones are quite broken, and then
> confirmed on an Ubuntu Hardy setup as well.)
DateTime::TimeZone::Local requires a set of additional classes to
operate, which are loaded at runtime through 'eval "use $class"', which
PAR will probably not detect ? certainly not without running, and not
completely in any case.
You want to include all the classes under the DateTime::TimeZone
namespace, such as DateTime::TimeZone::Australia::Melbourne.
(For me it blows up on DateTime::TimeZone::Local::Unix, which is
doubtless a symptom of the same issue.)
Regards,
Daniel
>
> The test script that fails:
> ----------------timetest.pl------------
> #!/usr/bin/perl
> use strict;
> use warnings;
>
> use DateTime;
> use DateTime::TimeZone;
>
> my $tz = DateTime::TimeZone->new( name => 'local' );
> print "Success!\n";
> ----------------------------
>
> Create the PAR with:
> pp -o datetime.par -M DateTime::Locale::en timetest.pl
> (That's on Etch.. If I'm on Hardy I need an extra: -M
> DateTime::TimeZone::Local::Unix )
>
> Then execute it:
> parl datetime.par timetest.pl
>
> I get "Cannot determine local time zone", rather than "Success!", on
> both Etch and Hardy.
>
> DateTime versions:
> Etch - 0.35
> Hardy - 0.42 and then 0.4501
>
> DateTime::TimeZone versions:
> Etch - 0.42
> Hardy - 0.7701 and then 0.8301
>
> Any thoughts if I'm Doing It Wrong, before I submit to RT?
>
> Cheers,
> Toby
> _______________________________________________
> Melbourne-pm mailing list
> Melbourne-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/melbourne-pm
From david.warring at gmail.com Mon Dec 22 11:56:12 2008
From: david.warring at gmail.com (David Warring)
Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 06:56:12 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] DateTime::TimeZone breaking under PAR?
In-Reply-To:
References:
Message-ID:
Hi Toby,
Rather this is a result of PAR's use of Module::ScanDeps to resolve
the contents of modules and their external dependencies.
Their are many techniques used by modules too dynamically load other
modules and resources. Some of these are not detected by
Module::ScanDeps.
DateTime::TimeZone is a notorious example. I've found, for example,
that anything loaded with Module::Pluggable also fails to be detected.
You can run Module::ScanDeps yourself to get a pretty good idea of how
it will resolve a particular module:
% scandeps.pl -e'use DateTime; use DateTime::TimeZone'
You'll see that it's missing all the timezones, eg:
DateTime::TimeZone::Australia::Melbourne has not been detected.
If all else fails, you could try installing your modules to a private
lib, as prescribed by Dominus, http://perlmonks.com/?node_id=682025,
then creating a PAR archive from that.
Hope this helps.
Cheers
David
On Mon, Dec 22, 2008 at 6:18 PM, Toby Wintermute wrote:
> Hmm,
> I encountered an odd problem with DateTime::TimeZone today.
>
> When using it via a PAR archive, it refused to determine the local timezone.
> (This was on a Debian Etch fresh install, albeit with upgraded PAR
> libraries, since the normal Etch ones are quite broken, and then
> confirmed on an Ubuntu Hardy setup as well.)
>
> The test script that fails:
> ----------------timetest.pl------------
> #!/usr/bin/perl
> use strict;
> use warnings;
>
> use DateTime;
> use DateTime::TimeZone;
>
> my $tz = DateTime::TimeZone->new( name => 'local' );
> print "Success!\n";
> ----------------------------
>
> Create the PAR with:
> pp -o datetime.par -M DateTime::Locale::en timetest.pl
> (That's on Etch.. If I'm on Hardy I need an extra: -M
> DateTime::TimeZone::Local::Unix )
>
> Then execute it:
> parl datetime.par timetest.pl
>
> I get "Cannot determine local time zone", rather than "Success!", on
> both Etch and Hardy.
>
> DateTime versions:
> Etch - 0.35
> Hardy - 0.42 and then 0.4501
>
> DateTime::TimeZone versions:
> Etch - 0.42
> Hardy - 0.7701 and then 0.8301
>
> Any thoughts if I'm Doing It Wrong, before I submit to RT?
>
> Cheers,
> Toby
> _______________________________________________
> Melbourne-pm mailing list
> Melbourne-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/melbourne-pm
>
From tjc at wintrmute.net Mon Dec 22 15:01:51 2008
From: tjc at wintrmute.net (Toby Wintermute)
Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 10:01:51 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] DateTime::TimeZone breaking under PAR?
In-Reply-To: <20081222151538.68FA29D9B@mailout.melmac.se>
References:
<20081222151538.68FA29D9B@mailout.melmac.se>
Message-ID:
2008/12/23 Johan Lindstr?m :
> At 08:18 2008-12-22, Toby Wintermute wrote:
>>
>> When using it via a PAR archive, it refused to determine the local
>> timezone.
>> (This was on a Debian Etch fresh install, albeit with upgraded PAR
>> libraries, since the normal Etch ones are quite broken, and then
>> confirmed on an Ubuntu Hardy setup as well.)
>
> Usually when things don't work under PAR/PerlApp/etc it's dynamically loaded
> modules that weren't packaged properly.
>
> I see you force DateTime::Locale::en to be packaged, presumably because it
> blew up without it. But there may be other modules it needs too. Presumably
> related to the time zone stuff.
>
> A super quick look in DateTime::TimeZone reveals a runtime require of
> DateTime::TimeZone::* .
>
> What if you manually add them all to the PAR file?
>
> (I usually put use statements in the source for this, with a comment saying
> it's for PAR).
A couple of other people have said it's a failure of Module::ScanDeps
to correctly identify all the required modules.. Some of which are
attempted to be loaded via a string-eval..
It makes sense, I suppose, since the name of the module it attempts to
load is generated procedurally.. but is a pain.
Manually adding all the DateTime::TimeZone::* files (and while one is
at it, the TZ::Locale::* files) did indeed fix the problem.
However, this seems like a wider problem with using PAR files..
How do you detect undetected runtime requirements?
Just install *every* requirement to a private INC, then PAR it in it's entirety?
Thanks for the help,
Toby
From tjc at wintrmute.net Mon Dec 22 15:03:51 2008
From: tjc at wintrmute.net (Toby Wintermute)
Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 10:03:51 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] Perl 5 now uses Git for version control
In-Reply-To:
References:
Message-ID:
In case you didn't catch this elsewhere:
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: L?on Brocard
Date: 2008/12/22
Subject: Perl 5 now uses Git for version control
Now you know what I've been working on for the last few months! Feel
free to forward and repost elsewhere. L?on
HOLLAND, Michigan - The Perl Foundation has migrated Perl 5 to the Git
version control system, making it easier than ever for Perl's development
team to continue to improve the language that powers many websites.
Moving from Perforce to git provides a number of benefits to the Perl
community:
- With a public repository and Git's extensive support for distributed
and offline work, working on Perl 5's source becomes easier for everyone
involved.
- Because Git is open source, all developers now have equal access to
the tools required to work on Perl's codebase.
- Core committers have less administrative work to do when integrating
contributed changes.
- Developers outside the core team can more easily work on experimental
changes to Perl before proposing them for inclusion in the next release.
- A vast array of improved repository and change analysis tools are now
available to Perl's developers.
- The new Git repository includes every version of Perl 5 ever released,
as well as every revision made during development.
Interested developers can get a copy of the Perl 5 Git repository at
at http://perl5.git.perl.org/perl.git
In true open source style, Sam Vilain converted Perl's history from
Perforce to Git. He did the work both in his spare time and in time
donated by his employer, Catalyst IT. He spent more than a year building
custom tools to transform 21 years of Perl history into the first
ever unified repository of every single change to Perl. In addition
to changes from Perforce, Sam patched together a comprehensive view
of Perl's history incorporating publicly available snapshot releases,
changes from historical mailing list archives and patch sets recovered
from the hard drives of previous Perl release engineers.
Perl 5 is used by businesses around the world including the BBC,
Amazon.com, LiveJournal, Ticketmaster, Craigslist and IMDb. Larry Wall
created Perl in 1987 while working as a systems administrator for NASA.
Larry released Perl 1.000 on December 18th 1987. Over the past 21 years,
Perl has grown into a high-level, general-purpose, dynamic programming
language and is widely used for Web development, Systems Administration,
Genomics and in many other disciplines. The most recent major version
of Perl 5 (5.10.0) was released one year ago.
Git is an open source version control system designed to handle very
large projects with speed and efficiency. Created by Linus Torvalds,
the inventor of Linux to handle the vast number of contributions to
the Linux Kernel, Git is highly flexible and extensible. Perl's motto,
"There's More Than One Way To Do It!" perfectly matches the Git workflow.
Nicholas Clark, the manager for Perl 5.8.9 which was released this week,
said "I'm looking forward to Git giving me the ability to work either
online or offline. Perforce is great when I have a network connection,
but until now those times when I've been trying to develop on trains
or planes, at stations or airports, I'm back in the 'dark ages' before
version control. Git solves this problem and more".
The hardware behind this and the systems administration time to maintain
it is donated by Booking.com. Booking.com has also recently donated
$50,000 to The Perl Foundation, to aid in the further development and
maintenance of the Perl programming language in general, and Perl 5.10
in particular.
Perl originally used the Revision Control System (RCS) until March
1997 when it switched to the Perforce Software Configuration Management
System. The Perforce repository was graciously hosted and maintained,
free of charge, by ActiveState. Perforce provided the core developers
with powerful tools, but these tools were not available to users outside
the core team. The switch to Git removes this barrier.
About The Perl Foundation (http://www.perlfoundation.org/) | The Perl
Foundation is dedicated to the advancement of the Perl programming
language through open discussion, collaboration, design, and code. The
Perl Foundation coordinates the efforts of numerous grass-roots Perl-based
groups, including: International Yet Another Perl Conferences (YAPC's),
Carries the legal responsibility for Perl 5 and Perl 6 and the Artistic
and Artistic 2.0 licenses, perl.org, Perl Mongers, and PerlMonks.
About Booking.com (http://www.booking.com/) | Booking.com is part of
Priceline.com (Nasdaq: PCLN). Its website attracts an average of 30
million unique visitors each month. Booking.com works with more than
57,000 affiliated hotels in 15,000 destinations around the world. Its
services are available in 21 languages. Booking.com currently has 24
offices in Amsterdam, Athens, Barcelona, Berlin, Cambridge, Cape Town,
Dubai, Dublin, London, Loul? (Portugal), Lyon, Madrid, Moscow, Munich,
New York, Orlando, Paris, Rome, San Francisco, Sydney, Singapore,
Stockholm, Vienna and Warsaw.
About Catalyst IT (NZ) Ltd (http://www.catalyst.net.nz/) | Catalyst IT
is New Zealand's premiere Open Source development house. Catalyst looks
after the development requirements for the NZ Electoral Enrolment Centre,
manage the .NZ registry, the largest NZ newspaper's online presence,
the NZ TAB and many other exciting projects, and are organising the 2010
Australasian Linux Conference to be held in Wellington, New Zealand.
From daniel at rimspace.net Mon Dec 22 16:17:28 2008
From: daniel at rimspace.net (Daniel Pittman)
Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2008 11:17:28 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] DateTime::TimeZone breaking under PAR?
In-Reply-To:
(Toby Wintermute's message of "Tue, 23 Dec 2008 10:01:51 +1100")
References:
<20081222151538.68FA29D9B@mailout.melmac.se>
Message-ID: <87abaniw2v.fsf@rimspace.net>
"Toby Wintermute" writes:
> 2008/12/23 Johan Lindstr?m :
>> At 08:18 2008-12-22, Toby Wintermute wrote:
[administratively, it would be nice if you didn't CC subscription-only
mailing lists in your posts; I am not a member of London.pm, so
anything that goes to them is held for moderation...]
>>> When using it via a PAR archive, it refused to determine the local
>>> timezone. (This was on a Debian Etch fresh install, albeit with
>>> upgraded PAR libraries, since the normal Etch ones are quite broken,
>>> and then confirmed on an Ubuntu Hardy setup as well.)
[...]
> It makes sense, I suppose, since the name of the module it attempts to
> load is generated procedurally.. but is a pain.
> Manually adding all the DateTime::TimeZone::* files (and while one is
> at it, the TZ::Locale::* files) did indeed fix the problem.
>
> However, this seems like a wider problem with using PAR files..
It is, and it isn't ? the model of automatically scanning for
dependencies is good, but is never a substitute for knowing your tools.
Part of the reason for avoiding PAR in favour of something that packages
CPAN modules whole is that it saves you, the developer, needing to do as
much work to understand the dependency model *inside* the Perl module.
> How do you detect undetected runtime requirements?
Exhaustive tests, run on the packaged version of the code, not just the
blib version.
> Just install *every* requirement to a private INC, then PAR it in it's
> entirety?
That isn't a bad strategy; using something to build PAR files of CPAN
modules whole, rather than installing them on your system and using the
dependency detection, also works.
(You can, naturally, merge those PAR files into your final distribution,
giving you the same "statically linked" final product.)
Regards,
Daniel
PAR, bringing back memories of shipping C++ application software on a
dozen Unix derivatives, and the work required to manage testing and
distribution there.
From jdthornton at ozemail.com.au Sun Dec 28 20:35:46 2008
From: jdthornton at ozemail.com.au (John Thornton)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 15:35:46 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] Australia's garbage computer training offerings
Message-ID:
Hello
I have scoured the earth looking for any Australian
computer trainers that can meet my needs. I am a maths graduate who's
starting programming as a beginner. I have messed about with python, java
and perl.
Cost is not a real issue. I am prepared to pay for a
good course taught by people who know their stuff. More important is to do a
course online that covers the specifics of programming: OOP, applets etc.
The language also isn't that important. I would even be prepared to give
Perl another go in spite of my expressed distaste for it on this list! The
learning style matters - those 5 day intensive things are no good for me.
Rather, I prefer a course that is spread out over time.
TAFE is too vague in its course descriptors.
Postgraduate uni costs the earth and I don't understand that fee help
business. I am reluctant to take a chance on a course for fear of not
getting what, I assume, is one of a very limited number of fee help places.
So, as a last resort I have had to look overseas even
with losses through exchange rates. There are no courses online in Australia
that meet my needs, as undemanding as I consider my needs to be. Thus I have
found an excellent overseas online course from the US and have enrolled. It
teaches all programming including Perl. But I will be starting with a
general intro course on OOP. I won't say what the school is - that may not
be appropriate on this list. But to give the most unsubtle attempt at a
cryptic clue you would be Irish if you couldn't guess it.
I am both disappointed and surprised at the lack of IT
offerings in Australia. With all due respect to the people reading this who
teach Perl, you are not focused on people like me. Rather, your market is
corporate where the employer pays for the training and the employee takes 5
days off work to do intensive Perl training. In itself that is not
objectionable since it's a valid market. But it does zap out people like me.
Paul Keating spoke of Australia being the clever country.
In the world of IT training we are the very very dumb country.
John
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From alfiejohn at gmail.com Sun Dec 28 21:28:02 2008
From: alfiejohn at gmail.com (Alfie John)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 16:28:02 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] Australia's garbage computer training offerings
In-Reply-To:
References:
Message-ID:
Hi John,
On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 3:35 PM, John Thornton wrote:
> Hello
>
> I have scoured the earth looking for any Australian
> computer trainers that can meet my needs. I am a maths graduate who's
> starting programming as a beginner. I have messed about with python, java
> and perl.
>
>
>
> Cost is not a real issue. I am prepared to pay for a
> good course taught by people who know their stuff. More important is to do a
> course online that covers the specifics of programming: OOP, applets etc.
> The language also isn't that important. I would even be prepared to give
> Perl another go in spite of my expressed distaste for it on this list! The
> learning style matters ? those 5 day intensive things are no good for me.
> Rather, I prefer a course that is spread out over time.
>
Is taking a course that important to you? Why not just bunker down with a
good book or two. If you are just starting out programming, I suggest not
looking at Perl. Once again, Perl is not suited as an introduction to
programming. Perl is like a fine V.S.O.P. If it's your first ever swig of
alcohol, you're going to be put off very quickly. Ease yourself into it with
alcopops like Python and Pascal and don't forget to stay away from the cheap
casks like Java.
If you are looking for specifics such as Applets, I think Java and Flash are
your only options. However you might want to try Python since it was
developed specifically to teach people how to program. I've found "Learning
Python" by Mark Lutz to be a good intro.
Forget about the specifics for now e.g. OOP and Applets. Stick with learning
general programming. There is no point learning the intricacies of
multiplexed IO if you don't even know what a byte is yet. It will take time
but if you stick at it, you should start seeing progress soon.
Alfie
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From benhare at gmail.com Sun Dec 28 21:52:18 2008
From: benhare at gmail.com (Ben Hare)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 16:52:18 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] Australia's garbage computer training offerings
In-Reply-To:
References:
Message-ID: <822765280812282152y64926e60u7a7542feb703d8ce@mail.gmail.com>
On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 4:28 PM, Alfie John wrote:
> Hi John,
>
> On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 3:35 PM, John Thornton
> wrote:
>>
>> Hello
>>
>> I have scoured the earth looking for any
>> Australian computer trainers that can meet my needs. I am a maths graduate
>> who's starting programming as a beginner. I have messed about with python,
>> java and perl.
>>
>>
>>
>> Cost is not a real issue. I am prepared to pay for
>> a good course taught by people who know their stuff. More important is to do
>> a course online that covers the specifics of programming: OOP, applets etc.
>> The language also isn't that important. I would even be prepared to give
>> Perl another go in spite of my expressed distaste for it on this list! The
>> learning style matters ? those 5 day intensive things are no good for me.
>> Rather, I prefer a course that is spread out over time.
>
> Is taking a course that important to you? Why not just bunker down with a
> good book or two.
couldn't agree more. why do you have to have someone teach you
everything? at least at this stage? there's plenty you can do
yourself.
also, a course i took at a tafe college here turned out to be the best
course i've ever taken.
my australian training allowed me to work all over the world too so it
can't be that bad. of course, it was also due to my own hard work and
self learning.
ps: i can't think offhand what course that is so top o' the mornin' to ya. [1]
Regards,
Ben.
1. HARE
> If you are just starting out programming, I suggest not
> looking at Perl. Once again, Perl is not suited as an introduction to
> programming. Perl is like a fine V.S.O.P. If it's your first ever swig of
> alcohol, you're going to be put off very quickly. Ease yourself into it with
> alcopops like Python and Pascal and don't forget to stay away from the cheap
> casks like Java.
>
> If you are looking for specifics such as Applets, I think Java and Flash are
> your only options. However you might want to try Python since it was
> developed specifically to teach people how to program. I've found "Learning
> Python" by Mark Lutz to be a good intro.
>
> Forget about the specifics for now e.g. OOP and Applets. Stick with learning
> general programming. There is no point learning the intricacies of
> multiplexed IO if you don't even know what a byte is yet. It will take time
> but if you stick at it, you should start seeing progress soon.
>
> Alfie
>
> _______________________________________________
> Melbourne-pm mailing list
> Melbourne-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/melbourne-pm
>
From wayland at wayland.id.au Sun Dec 28 23:30:48 2008
From: wayland at wayland.id.au (Timothy S. Nelson)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 18:30:48 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] Australia's garbage computer training offerings
In-Reply-To:
References:
Message-ID:
On Mon, 29 Dec 2008, John Thornton wrote:
> Cost is not a real issue. I am prepared to pay for a good course
> taught by people who know their stuff. More important is to do a course online that covers
> the specifics of programming: OOP, applets etc. The language also isn?t that important. I
> would even be prepared to give Perl another go in spite of my expressed distaste for it on
> this list! The learning style matters ? those 5 day intensive things are no good for me.
In response to those (not John) who recommended that he get a good
book, I agree that browsing the web or if necessary getting a book work would
work for me, but I'm also aware that some people learn much better from
another person than they do from a book. If that wasn't the case, corporate
training wouldn't exist. If he has the money, I think he should be free to
choose a learning style that suits him.
> TAFE is too vague in its course descriptors.
Only one solution to this (and it's not just TAFE, either :) ), talk
to the people who will actually be running the TAFE course.
> course from the US and have enrolled. It teaches all programming including Perl. But I will
> be starting with a general intro course on OOP. I won?t say what the school is ? that may
> not be appropriate on this list. But to give the most unsubtle attempt at a cryptic clue
> you would be Irish if you couldn?t guess it.
Feel free to say it; it may not always be appropriate to mention
businesses, but since you're a happy customer rather than a spruiker, I reckon
it's fair enough.
> Australia. With all due respect to the people reading this who teach Perl, you are not
> focused on people like me. Rather, your market is corporate where the employer pays for the
> training and the employee takes 5 days off work to do intensive Perl training. In itself
> that is not objectionable since it?s a valid market. But it does zap out people like me.
It seems to me like what you really want is a Uni/TAFE style course,
but have then objected to them due to either vagueness or cost. Rather than
complaining to people in the corporate sector, I'd advise you to figure out
how to address either the vagueness issue of TAFE (see my suggestion above),
or the cost issue of Uni (Tip: have you tried talking this over with
Centrelink? Maybe you should be looking at an undergrad unit instead of
postgrad? Do you need certification, or just teaching?)
> Paul Keating spoke of Australia being the clever country. In the world
> of IT training we are the very very dumb country.
Oh, I wouldn't go that far. The Australian system seems to be well
set up for a lot of people, but it's more difficult for the few who fall into
your situation. That'll mean a bit of extra work for you (ie. addressing the
TAFE vagueness by contacting the person running the course), but hopefully
that's not too onerous.
:)
---------------------------------------------------------------------
| Name: Tim Nelson | Because the Creator is, |
| E-mail: wayland at wayland.id.au | I am |
---------------------------------------------------------------------
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Version 3.12
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From jdthornton at ozemail.com.au Mon Dec 29 01:25:15 2008
From: jdthornton at ozemail.com.au (John Thornton)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 20:25:15 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] graphics and programming
Message-ID: <8A488A04BDB24BF8BCB4B2A3616B6AB8@homepc>
Further to my points about training, I should explain a few
more things. I am studying a Dip of graphics design: a totally computerized
Diploma focused on Adobe programs; there is no real drawing etc bar a few
thumbnail sketches. And that's fine. I couldn't draw a stick man.
So when I started that Dip last year I got into programming
for the first time. I have access to all the VTC tutorials as part of the
Dip. Thus I looked at them. There was Perl, Java, C, computer forensics.
Then I got some compilers and started to enjoy ruby and
python. I am 33. I wish that I got into programming when I was 12 or 20. But
it just never happened. I never played with a Commodore set or an Atari. In
fact I left school utterly computer illiterate; I couldn't put a disk in the
disk drive. That era was a garbage era for teaching kids computers. I wish
that I had gone through the era 5 to 10 years later.
So where I stand now is that I would like to program for 2
reasons [1] I like it and [2] I want to complement and extend my design Dip.
At one pt I thought that Java might do this by being a language that does 3D
graphics programming. Then I thought of Perl or PHP as web programming
things.
I have no real prejudices against any programming language. I
have always used a Windows OS.
Since people don't mind me saying the school for the OOP course
is the O'Reilly School of Technology.
Will I come back to Perl? It's possible. Have to think about it.
John
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From benhare at gmail.com Mon Dec 29 01:42:31 2008
From: benhare at gmail.com (Ben Hare)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 20:42:31 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] graphics and programming
In-Reply-To: <8A488A04BDB24BF8BCB4B2A3616B6AB8@homepc>
References: <8A488A04BDB24BF8BCB4B2A3616B6AB8@homepc>
Message-ID: <822765280812290142p39a42357p3ba36129c33b2015@mail.gmail.com>
>
>
> Since people don't mind me saying the school for the OOP course
> is the O'Reilly School of Technology.
>
lol!!!! oh no!!!!! looks like the joke really is on me!!! dammit!!!
cheers,
Ben.
>
>
> Will I come back to Perl? It's possible. Have to think about it.
>
>
>
> John
>
> _______________________________________________
> Melbourne-pm mailing list
> Melbourne-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/melbourne-pm
>
From jdthornton at ozemail.com.au Mon Dec 29 01:44:56 2008
From: jdthornton at ozemail.com.au (ajthornton)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 20:44:56 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] graphics and programming
In-Reply-To: <822765280812290142p39a42357p3ba36129c33b2015@mail.gmail.com>
References: <8A488A04BDB24BF8BCB4B2A3616B6AB8@homepc>
<822765280812290142p39a42357p3ba36129c33b2015@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <5A78F9B5AED14BFFA7D851B51F42FCB2@homepc>
I am serious! If you google it it comes up.
John
-----Original Message-----
From: Ben Hare [mailto:benhare at gmail.com]
Sent: Monday, 29 December 2008 8:43 PM
To: John Thornton
Cc: melbourne-pm at pm.org
Subject: Re: [Melbourne-pm] graphics and programming
>
>
> Since people don't mind me saying the school for the OOP
course
> is the O'Reilly School of Technology.
>
lol!!!! oh no!!!!! looks like the joke really is on me!!! dammit!!!
cheers,
Ben.
>
>
> Will I come back to Perl? It's possible. Have to think about
it.
>
>
>
> John
>
> _______________________________________________
> Melbourne-pm mailing list
> Melbourne-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/melbourne-pm
>
From benhare at gmail.com Mon Dec 29 01:47:47 2008
From: benhare at gmail.com (Ben Hare)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 20:47:47 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] graphics and programming
In-Reply-To: <5A78F9B5AED14BFFA7D851B51F42FCB2@homepc>
References: <8A488A04BDB24BF8BCB4B2A3616B6AB8@homepc>
<822765280812290142p39a42357p3ba36129c33b2015@mail.gmail.com>
<5A78F9B5AED14BFFA7D851B51F42FCB2@homepc>
Message-ID: <822765280812290147wc612e89o60b7d6a37e0a0603@mail.gmail.com>
yeah i know! what i mean is, i specifically referenced my irish name
saying "i can't think of that school" and the name is of course, a
very common irish name - o'reilly!!!
On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 8:44 PM, ajthornton wrote:
> I am serious! If you google it it comes up.
>
> John
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Ben Hare [mailto:benhare at gmail.com]
> Sent: Monday, 29 December 2008 8:43 PM
> To: John Thornton
> Cc: melbourne-pm at pm.org
> Subject: Re: [Melbourne-pm] graphics and programming
>
>>
>>
>> Since people don't mind me saying the school for the OOP
> course
>> is the O'Reilly School of Technology.
>>
>
> lol!!!! oh no!!!!! looks like the joke really is on me!!! dammit!!!
>
> cheers,
>
> Ben.
>
>>
>>
>> Will I come back to Perl? It's possible. Have to think about
> it.
>>
>>
>>
>> John
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Melbourne-pm mailing list
>> Melbourne-pm at pm.org
>> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/melbourne-pm
>>
>
>
From jdthornton at ozemail.com.au Mon Dec 29 02:33:55 2008
From: jdthornton at ozemail.com.au (John Thornton)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 21:33:55 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] comparing languages table
Message-ID:
For anyone who is interested, here is a cross table of 9
programming languages including Perl:
http://www.jvoegele.com/software/langcomp.html
I can't vouch for its correctness or otherwise; a lot of the
terms are foreign to me I am sure that there are people on this mailing list
who would know what the tables and discussions mean.
John
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From alfiejohn at gmail.com Mon Dec 29 02:43:53 2008
From: alfiejohn at gmail.com (Alfie John)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 21:43:53 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] graphics and programming
In-Reply-To: <8A488A04BDB24BF8BCB4B2A3616B6AB8@homepc>
References: <8A488A04BDB24BF8BCB4B2A3616B6AB8@homepc>
Message-ID:
> So when I started that Dip last year I got into programming
> for the first time. I have access to all the VTC tutorials as part of the
> Dip. Thus I looked at them. There was Perl, Java, C, computer forensics?
>
>
>
> Then I got some compilers and started to enjoy ruby and
> python. I am 33. I wish that I got into programming when I was 12 or 20. But
> it just never happened.
>
We can all think of things to wish away. I don't see you starting
programming at 33 to be a problem.
> So where I stand now is that I would like to program for 2
> reasons [1] I like it and [2] I want to complement and extend my design Dip.
>
>
Sounds like you've caught the programming bug :)
> At one pt I thought that Java might do this by being a language that does
> 3D graphics programming. Then I thought of Perl or PHP as web programming
> things.
>
It sucks when people pigeon hole things before they get the full picture.
Maybe you should check out the following:
http://sdl.perl.org/
http://pygame.org/wiki/about
Java can also do 3D graphics, but I also think it's not a great introduction
to programming.
Alfie
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From alec.clews at gmail.com Mon Dec 29 03:35:32 2008
From: alec.clews at gmail.com (Alec Clews)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 22:35:32 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] Australia's garbage computer training offerings
In-Reply-To:
References:
Message-ID: <4958B604.2040400@gmail.com>
Education of IT professionals is one of my little hobby horses and I
wrote some pithy words on what I thought were important topics for a
novice developer to target in the first few months and years
http://alecthegeek.wordpress.com/2008/11/03/what-a-young-developer-needs-to-know/
It's only my personal opinion and I claim no special expertise beyond
general IT technical background. Please feel free to critique
Alfie John wrote:
> Hi John,
>
> On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 3:35 PM, John Thornton
> > wrote:
>
> Hello
>
> I have scoured the earth looking for any Australian computer
> trainers that can meet my needs. I am a maths graduate who's
> starting programming as a beginner. I have messed about with
> python, java and perl.
>
> Cost is not a real issue. I am prepared to pay for a good course
> taught by people who know their stuff. More important is to do a
> course online that covers the specifics of programming: OOP,
> applets etc. The language also isn't that important. I would even
> be prepared to give Perl another go in spite of my expressed
> distaste for it on this list! The learning style matters ? those 5
> day intensive things are no good for me. Rather, I prefer a course
> that is spread out over time.
>
>
> Is taking a course that important to you? Why not just bunker down
> with a good book or two. If you are just starting out programming, I
> suggest not looking at Perl. Once again, Perl is not suited as an
> introduction to programming. Perl is like a fine V.S.O.P. If it's your
> first ever swig of alcohol, you're going to be put off very quickly.
> Ease yourself into it with alcopops like Python and Pascal and don't
> forget to stay away from the cheap casks like Java.
>
> If you are looking for specifics such as Applets, I think Java and
> Flash are your only options. However you might want to try Python
> since it was developed specifically to teach people how to program.
> I've found "Learning Python" by Mark Lutz to be a good intro.
>
> Forget about the specifics for now e.g. OOP and Applets. Stick with
> learning general programming. There is no point learning the
> intricacies of multiplexed IO if you don't even know what a byte is
> yet. It will take time but if you stick at it, you should start seeing
> progress soon.
>
> Alfie
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> Melbourne-pm mailing list
> Melbourne-pm at pm.org
> http://mail.pm.org/mailman/listinfo/melbourne-pm
From jarich at perltraining.com.au Mon Dec 29 03:52:54 2008
From: jarich at perltraining.com.au (Jacinta Richardson)
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2008 22:52:54 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] Australia's garbage computer training offerings
In-Reply-To:
References:
Message-ID: <4958BA16.6090409@perltraining.com.au>
John Thornton wrote:
> I have scoured the earth looking for any
> Australian computer trainers that can meet my needs. I am a maths
> graduate who?s starting programming as a beginner. I have messed about
> with python, Java and Perl.
You have a fine skill-set to go on our courses.
> Cost is not a real issue. I am prepared to pay
> for a good course taught by people who know their stuff. More important
> is to do a course online that covers the specifics of programming: OOP,
> applets etc. The language also isn?t that important.
You have a very specialised idea of what the specifics of programming
are. I would say that the really general concepts you need to know
about are:
* variable types (depends on your language, but once you've done the
basic type(s) you must also have a firm handle on lists/arrays and
hashes/dictionaries)
* how to make more complex data structures (arrays of arrays, arrays of
hashes, hashes of array, hashes of hashes, mixed hashes etc) and how to
print them in a human readable form
* typical functions/concepts you should be able to rely on most
languages to provide you with (print, string length, array length, hash
keys etc)
* control flow (while, conditionals etc) and how to make appropriate
decisions about structure, conditional choices etc
* function/subroutine declaration and usage (including why and when
you'd break things into such)
* creating libraries/modules, understanding name spaces and packages etc
* using existing libraries, and OO interfaces to those
* file input/output, directory interaction, system interaction, security
* problem solving in an imperative paradigm
Once you have a firm understanding of all of these concepts in one
language, you have a very good chance of moving them across to another
(imperative) language. You will always have to remember that just
because you learned it one way, doesn't mean that's the best way. There
are numerous things that Perl does better than C (for example), but
there are also lots of things that Perl does that are an embarrassment
which many are looking forward to losing in Perl 6 (most of the special
variables for example). Likewise you'll find that there are numerous
things that Java does better than but if you know Java
well enough, you'll be aware of it's flaws too and able to appreciate
the things that does better than it.
I personally feel that object oriented programming is a paradigm better
learned after you've got all the general concepts down. In Perl you can
use objects provided by other classes without having to understand much
more than the synopsis and I think this is brilliant. But even without
Perl, I'd prefer teaching C before C++ or Java. So I, as a trainer,
would list OOP and applets as a nice extra in a course about
programming, not as a key feature.
> The learning style matters ? those 5 day intensive
> things are no good for me. Rather, I prefer a course that is spread out
> over time.
There are two possible styles of running a course. An x-day intensive
version or one which is spread out. From a logistical point of view,
x-day intensive courses are cheaper to run (lab hire is per day or half
day not per hour (owning labs is even more expensive); trainers can be
sent all over the country as required rather than being required to be
in a given place every Thursday afternoon), involve a lot less
organisation (people are either there or not there for the whole course,
not turning up half way through or dropping out) and are easy to sell.
When an employer decides they want their employee to know a language,
they want that employee to know the language as soon as possible; not
after a 6 month long course during which circumstances might make it
impossible to keep giving that employee appropriate leave to make it to
classes.
So commercial businesses have to run intensive courses. The few times
that Perl Training Australia has considered running evening or weekend
courses (and especially the few times when employers have asked us to
consider it) the interest from possible attendees has been nil. People
in 9 to 5 jobs would much rather miss a week from work to learn a new
skill than give up their very precious evenings and weekends - even if
that skill makes them more employable. I don't blame them either.
This is fine, because we have the higher education sector to cover those
who want to learn over time.
> TAFE is too vague in its course descriptors.
> Postgraduate uni costs the earth and I don?t understand that fee help
> business. I am reluctant to take a chance on a course for fear of not
> getting what, I assume, is one of a very limited number of fee help
> places.
You say above that cost isn't a real issue but perhaps it is. I doubt
you'd really want to do a full postgraduate university degree anyway;
chances are it would be overkill. A TAFE diploma in programming should
cover pretty much everything you need to know. If their course
descriptions are too vague do some more research. Go in and talk to the
lecturer about what the course will cover, or link us a few courses
you'd consider taking and ask us for our advice. Vagueness is a poor
excuse; it'd be better just to say that you'd rather not go to TAFE.
> So, as a last resort I have had to look overseas
> even with losses through exchange rates. There are no courses online in
> Australia that meet my needs, as undemanding as I consider my needs to
> be.
Online training is a whole lot of work for very little gain. It's easy
enough to video sessions and put them online, but for skills like
programming it's important to be able to ask questions; get assistance
when your program doesn't compile and you can't spot why; get feedback
on why your solution is taking so long to run. Even with that aside,
customers expect online training courses to cost less than face to face
courses; but that's only possible if you're getting sufficient demand
for them. I would hate to think of how long it would cost to recoup the
initial time investment if I were to generate a high quality online
course; yet alone the time required to keep the content up-to-date.
Small businesses like mine can't afford it. Even the bigger businesses
like IIT can't afford it. Don't underestimate the time required for
keeping the course up to date; we spend between 1 and 2 days after every
single course, adjusting our course notes so they'll be better for the
next run.
Your needs aren't particularly demanding, but the Australian market is
not big enough to make it efficient for Australian companies to meet them.
> I am both disappointed and surprised at the lack of
> IT offerings in Australia. With all due respect to the people reading
> this who teach Perl, you are not focused on people like me. Rather, your
> market is corporate where the employer pays for the training and the
> employee takes 5 days off work to do intensive Perl training. In itself
> that is not objectionable since it?s a valid market. But it does zap out
> people like me.
We don't see much evidence that there are masses of people like you. We
get less than 1 such enquiry a year (certainly less than 7 in the 7
years we've been in business). Since we're training about 150 people
per year, it isn't cost efficient for us to adjust our course styles for
that < 1%. I'm fairly certain that most people with your requirements
choose to learn from a book, online tutorial or - more often - a TAFE
course.
We make our course notes available on line for precisely this reason.
If someone wants to learn Perl, and is able and willing to do so from a
book, then we'd rather they use our book than anyone else's. We provide
free support for our course notes and answer any questions people who
are self-learning may have. Although our exercises and answers files
aren't available for download from our website, that's neither an
insurmountable barrier to those learning Perl nor something that can't
be overcome with a polite request to us. ;)
John Thornton also wrote:
> I am 33. I wish that I got into programming when I was 12 or 20.
> But it just never happened. I never played with a Commodore set or
> an Atari. In fact I left school utterly computer illiterate; I
> couldn?t put a disk in the disk drive. That era was a garbage era
> for teaching kids computers. I wish that I had gone through the
> era 5 to 10 years later.
A good many of us are the same age as you. Some of us were lucky and
didn't leave school computer illiterate, and perhaps others of us did.
I realise that that era had great diversity in the quality of
"computer lessons" (all of mine were pretty bad too) but I'd never have
thought of calling it "garbage". When I left school I could use a
computer to run applications (games and otherwise), but had very little
other interest in them. Still I... bravely chose a Software Engineering
degree and learned a whole lot more at university.
I don't view being 33 as much of a hurdle to your learning to program
though. The biggest issue is whether you can make the time to do so;
finding free time is so much easier when you're younger and your parents
or Centerlink will support your learning.
As you have stated that you're not a huge fan of Perl, I thought I'd
point out that there are a whole host of other programming user groups
in Melbourne which may be able to further assist you. You can find the
list of the ones I know about at
http://perl.net.au/wiki/Melbourne#User_Groups_-_Software_Development
All the best,
J
From daniel at rimspace.net Mon Dec 29 05:08:38 2008
From: daniel at rimspace.net (Daniel Pittman)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 00:08:38 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] comparing languages table
In-Reply-To: (John Thornton's
message of "Mon, 29 Dec 2008 21:33:55 +1100")
References:
Message-ID: <87vdt39lih.fsf@rimspace.net>
"John Thornton" writes:
For those short on time, the executive summary:
This is an outdated, inaccurate, misleading, poorly informed survey that
fails to effectively cover the limited material it aims for, let alone
addressing any language developments in the last ten years.
> For anyone who is interested, here is a cross table of 9 programming
> languages including Perl:
>
> http://www.jvoegele.com/software/langcomp.html
>
> I can?t vouch for its correctness or otherwise; a lot of the terms are
> foreign to me I am sure that there are people on this mailing list who
> would know what the tables and discussions mean.
Well, it is vaguely correct, but frequently meaningless: many of the
statements are useless, in the sense that "football is a game with a
ball" is useless ? not actually untrue, but not helpful.
For example, Ruby has "pure" OO support. This is, arguably, true, but
the implementation of the language makes this radically different from
the "pure" OO implementation in Smalltalk.
Not to mention that "pure" is a very dubious concept when it comes to
object oriented programming; they also fail to identify some factors
such as 'autobox', which allows Perl to treat scalar values as first
class objects...
It is also notable that they assume that OO programing requires that
"all operations are messages to objects", which is not actually true.
CLOS is definitely object oriented, but did not treat any operations in
that fashion ? and neither does any other multiple dispatch language.
Further, they make the mistake of dividing typing into a one-axis
"static vs dynamic" distinction. This is extremely wrong, since it
completely discards critical differences: C++ has "static" typing, while
Perl has "dynamic" ? but this disregards the ability to transform blobs
of memory under C++ bypassing the type system, while Perl retains strong
type information at all times.[1]
This is, again, not actually wrong, just very misleading.
Furthermore, their garbage collection entry is wrong: C++ with garbage
collection has multiple implementation, and their Ruby entry presumably
only covers one implementation ? the JVM and CLR based Ruby interpreters
have, naturally, different GC properties...
The design-by-contract entry is simply wrong, their multithreading entry
is extremely misleading[2] as well as wrong[3], as is their regular
expressions entry, and their "built in security" section is extremely
weakly defined, significantly misleading, and again neglects the various
non-MRI Ruby interpreters, not to mention the non-mainline Pythons...
Finally, citing a study that is widely considered weak is not the
... best approach to a well supported argument, and this "survey"
includes one as part of the consideration.
I guess they were up-front about how bad it was, anyway.
So, yeah, overall: not what I would call a reliable survey of the
languages. Plus, they missed a number of features like Hindley Milner
type inference that, you know, are really fairly important these days.
Regards,
Daniel
Footnotes:
[1] Plentiful conversions conveniently embedded in the language make
this fairly transparent to the user, but the language has "strong"
typing, unlike "weak" C/C++ typing.
[2] It claims that C++ has multithreading support via libraries; the
language itself has no thread support, and is not specifically
thread safe, although implementations can be.
[3] Perl has threads.
From paul at dwerryhouse.com.au Mon Dec 29 16:34:57 2008
From: paul at dwerryhouse.com.au (Paul Dwerryhouse)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 11:34:57 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] LWP/https timeout issue
Message-ID: <20081230003457.GA19459@dwerryhouse.com.au>
Hi all,
I've run across a small issue when using LWP with https connections, in that
it completely ignores the 'timeout' parameter.
A quick way to demonstrate this is with the following example I've taken
from a Redhat bug report (https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=460716):
If you run the this command to an IP address that doesn't exist, it
will timeout after one second, as requested:
lwp-request -uxS -t 1 http://10.0.0.42/
However, if you change it so that it uses https instead, it ignores the
timeout parameter (and thus takes much longer to die):
lwp-request -uxS -t 1 https://10.0.0.42/
The above bug report mentions a workaround that involves modifying
LWP/Protocol/http.pm and Net/HTTPS.pm - I've tested this, and it fixes it, but
I'd really prefer not to have this be a requirement for my code when it is
finished. Just wondering if anyone has hit this issue before, or if someone
could think of a way that I could work around this from my own code...
To complicate matters, I'm not calling LWP directly, but rather using it
via SOAP::Lite:
$soap_conn = SOAP::Lite
->uri('url:Blah::Handler')
->proxy('https://localhost:81/blah',timeout => 5);
$response = $soap_conn->function(
SOAP::Data->name('param' => 'whatever'))->result;
Cheers,
Paul
--
Paul Dwerryhouse | PGP Key ID: 0x6B91B584
From cas at taz.net.au Mon Dec 29 16:53:10 2008
From: cas at taz.net.au (Craig Sanders)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 11:53:10 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] Australia's garbage computer training offerings
In-Reply-To:
References:
Message-ID: <20081230005310.GA10243@taz.net.au>
On Mon, Dec 29, 2008 at 03:35:46PM +1100, John Thornton wrote:
> I am both disappointed and surprised at the lack of IT offerings in
> Australia. With all due respect to the people reading this who teach
> Perl, you are not focused on people like me. Rather, your market is
> corporate where the employer pays for the training and the employee
> takes 5 days off work to do intensive Perl training. In itself that
> is not objectionable since it's a valid market. But it does zap out
> people like me.
i assume you're referring to Perl Training Australia. Their courses
are expensive and tailored to the corporate market as you say. They
are also, however, very very good. They are intended for people with
programming experience who need to learn perl or improve their existing
perl skills.
Fortunately, they also cater for "people like you" (and me) too. If
you can't afford the fees then you can download the course notes(*) for
several of their courses for free, and work through them on your own
time at your own pace.
http://perltraining.com.au/notes.html
highly recommended.
buy a copy of the Camel book ("Programming Perl" pub by O'Reilly &
Assoc.), and start with PTA's Programming Perl course ("progperl.pdf").
Follow that up with Object Oriented Perl. Then the others as suits your
needs/interests. most of all, practice.
progperl.pdf starts from the basics of programming in a very clear and
easy to follow manner. if you can't learn perl (and generic programming
concepts) using this tutorial, then you may as well give up even trying
anything else.
(*) actually, they're more like step-by-step tutorials rather than just
"notes".
> Paul Keating spoke of Australia being the clever country. In the
> world of IT training we are the very very dumb country.
or perhaps we're the land of the whingers.
craig
--
craig sanders
BOFH excuse #46:
waste water tank overflowed onto computer
From jdthornton at ozemail.com.au Mon Dec 29 21:49:11 2008
From: jdthornton at ozemail.com.au (John Thornton)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 16:49:11 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] thanks and thoughts on Perl
Message-ID: <7FEFAE807DC146D9894727FAAEC79910@homepc>
Thanks to all who responded. Now I have so much to think
about. This will probably be my last post on this list; I am not a Perl
programmer and will be looking into Python, Ruby etc lists that I do program
in.
My thoughts on how I like to learn to program:
[1] Playing with the program after skimming through a tutorial.
For instance in python 3.0 it is interesting that
4*'cat'
catcatcatcat
But I found this:
0*'cat'
' '
-5*'cat'
' '
In other words any number<0 0r =0 multiplied by a string gets
the single quotes with nothing between. Can't work out why that is.
[2] Modifying a program that already works. For instance I took
a Ruby calculator program and added the ** exponentiation function to it.
[3] comparing the same idea in different languages such as a
loop.
Perl and Java are very hard to do [1] and [2] with. [3] might
be possible in them. Ruby and Python are easy for doing all 3. Perl might be
a great language. But I have not found it to be beginner friendly for tyros
like me.
John
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From daniel at rimspace.net Mon Dec 29 23:04:06 2008
From: daniel at rimspace.net (Daniel Pittman)
Date: Tue, 30 Dec 2008 18:04:06 +1100
Subject: [Melbourne-pm] thanks and thoughts on Perl
In-Reply-To: <7FEFAE807DC146D9894727FAAEC79910@homepc> (John Thornton's
message of "Tue, 30 Dec 2008 16:49:11 +1100")
References: <7FEFAE807DC146D9894727FAAEC79910@homepc>
Message-ID: <877i5i9mah.fsf@rimspace.net>
"John Thornton" writes:
> Thanks to all who responded. Now I have so much to think about. This
> will probably be my last post on this list; I am not a Perl programmer
> and will be looking into Python, Ruby etc lists that I do program in.
>
> My thoughts on how I like to learn to program:
>
> [1] Playing with the program after skimming through a tutorial. For
> instance in python 3.0 it is interesting that
>
> 4*?cat?
> catcatcatcat
>
> But I found this:
> 0*?cat?
> ??
> -5*?cat?
> ??
>
> In other words any number<0 0r =0 multiplied by a string gets the
> single quotes with nothing between. Can?t work out why that is.
Because python 3 presumably overloads number '*' string as 'repeat the
string number times', and zero or less copies of 'cat' are the empty
string, ''.
> [2] Modifying a program that already works. For instance I took a Ruby
> calculator program and added the ** exponentiation function to it.
>
> [3] comparing the same idea in different languages such as a loop.
You might find more value addressing yourself to higher level concepts
than loops, in your assessment of different languages. That is, at the
end of the day, a trivial bit of syntax that matters very little.
You did say "such as" here, so perhaps you already are comparing
interesting features rather than trivialities...
> Perl and Java are very hard to do [1] and [2] with.
Regarding example one:
Perl may require a little reading, but "'cat' x 4" does what you might
expect from the Python version; the multiplication operator gives you
integer conversion of the string, then numeric multiplication.
I can't really comment on Java, but the example given is so trivial is
to be more or less meaningless in most cases.
As to option two: as stated, this is more or less impossible to comment
on. The question, for me, is "did you find it difficult because you
didn't understand the language you were using, or because you found a
bad program to modify, or because the language was actually hard?"
> [3] might be possible in them. Ruby and Python are easy for doing all
> 3. Perl might be a great language. But I have not found it to be
> beginner friendly for tyros like me.
Great. Good luck with whatever language you do select, then.
Regards,
Daniel